


Beyond Nova Touhou 2

by Drk_Nexus



Series: Beyond Nova Touhou [2]
Category: Touhou Project
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-15
Updated: 2017-05-15
Packaged: 2018-11-01 02:25:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10912419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drk_Nexus/pseuds/Drk_Nexus
Summary: The hit sequel to the hit parody has been re-uploaded. Loosely adapted from Embodiment of Scarlet Devil.





	1. How Did It Get That Name, Anyway?

It was another slow day for Alice Reimu. Ever since her trip to the Underworld, life in Touhou had been exceptionally tame. No trees were throwing the universe out of balance; no evil magical girls had risen up to try to take over the world; nor were there even any low level monsters threatening her with bullet hell on earth. It was, simply put, a boring few months. Luckily, that was about to change.

It all started when Alice’s doorbell rang one day. At her door was a postal delivery girl. (Everyone in the land of Touhou was a girl; through generations of eugenics and culling, the Empire managed to remove puberty and males from their biology. It was a small price to pay for the magic they received in return.) “I have a message for Alice Reimu,” the messenger said. “Is this where I may find her?”

“Yes,” Alice replied. “That’s me.”

The messenger reached into her bag of messages and fumbled around for one in particular. She pulled out an envelope and handed it to Alice. “I’ve been instructed to tell you that you’ve been cordially invited by the great Miss Remilia to the Scarlet Devil Mansion for a prestigious dinner party.”

Alice ripped the envelope open, finding the official invitation card inside. “Me?” she asked. “Why would I be invited to a shindig like this?”

 “Your recent exploits in the Underworld have not gone unnoticed,” the messenger explained. “You and several other unsung heroes are being brought together for this event. It is to be a banquet in your honor.”

“Gonna sing us the song we deserve, eh?” Alice asked.

“Something to that effect,” the messenger said. “If you have no further questions, I’ll be on my way. I have a few more invitations to send out yet.” Before she left, she pulled another paper out of her bag. “Shall I mark you down as attending?”

“Are you kidding?” Alice said. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

***

A week passed, and the day of the party finally arrived. Alice had put on her best outfit: a nice light blue dress, perfectly matching the color of the morning sky. It made her an invisible bullet as she flew through the big blue. Within an hour, her destination was within sight. Alice slowed down and landed in front of the locked gate of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, where she was met by the Mansion’s gatekeeper, Hong Kong Meiling, standing guard.

“State your business here, _youkrai_ ,” Hong Kong said.

Alice did not let the slanderous insult faze her. “I’m Alice Reimu, I’m here for the party.” She flashed her ticket.

“Great!” Hong Kong said. “Welcome to the Scarlet Devil Mansion!” She opened the gate, and Alice entered the mansion grounds. The door to the mansion itself was unlocked. Alice went inside.

The entrance chamber was a pristine sight to behold. A bright polished floor with alternating white and red tiles. Walls of equally vibrant crimson, the lights casting perfect shadows behind statues of unfamiliar magical girls of lore. The statues, in case it wasn’t obvious, were made of solid ruby gemstone.

“Welcome,” a voice said. Alice turned to the direction it came from. The speaker was a fairly normal looking magical girl, perhaps a little shorter than the norm, wearing a dazzling red outfit. “I am your host, Remilia Flandre. Alice Reimu, I presume?”

“Yes,” Alice said. “Nice to meet you.”

“The pleasure is mine, Miss Reimu. I’ve heard so much about you, all of it good,” Remilia said.

“Well that explains why I was invited to this party,” Alice said.

“And a good sense of humor too!” Remilia said. “I can already tell, you’ll be the _life_ of the party. Come, let me show you to the rest of our guests.” Remilia put her arm around Alice and the two of them began to walk down the central hallway.

“So…” Alice said, “how did this place get its name, anyway?”

“Ah, that is a fascinating story,” Remilia said. “It begins twelve hundred years ago, when the Flandre family still had a central role in the Empire’s dealings. My great, great, great… My very great grandmother was the Empress’s own war advisor. That was her back there, the statue at the entrance. Sakuya Flandre, the original Scarlet Devil. It wasn’t a nickname she was given; it was a nickname she earned, a nickname that she claimed for herself. It was her self-awarded prize for leading the Empress on a successful campaign of aggressive territorial expansion. She was quite the master tactician, or so the legend now goes. Give her a blank sheet of paper, and she’d use it to slit twenty throats before the day was over. Ask her why she did it, and she’d say she was simply signing her name.

“This is just the stuff of legends, mind you. We all know how much the empresses like to exaggerate their reigns. In truth, Sakuya Flandre probably wasn’t nearly as bloodthirsty as the stories like to make her out to be. But from the facts we do have… Let’s just say I’m glad the stories also say she was a family person. You know, some say her ghost still haunts these halls.”

“Really? Who says that?” Alice asked.

“Why, I do, of course,” Remilia said with a giggle. “It keeps up the Mansion’s intrigue. And intrigue is _never_ a bad thing. Ah, here we are.” The two had come to a large double door. Remilia pushed them open and offered Alice to take the first steps inside. “You’ve now officially arrived at the party.”

Inside the guest room was a motley of faces both familiar and unknown to Alice. “Hi everyone,” Alice said.

“Nice of you to drop by, Alice,” said Marisa Chen. “We can finally start the party now that you’re here.”

Alice smirked. “I knew you wouldn’t start without me,” she said to her longtime rival.

 “I don’t believe we’ve met before,” another guest said. Alice had hardly noticed her standing in the shadows. (Or… were the shadows standing on her?). “My name is Rumia. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Nice to meet you, too,” Alice said. “I think I’ve heard of you before. Aren’t you—Yuyuko!” Alice said upon seeing Yuyuko Youmuko behind Rumia. “Hey girl, how’ve ya been?”

“Hello, Alice,” Yuyuko said. “I’m glad you could make it.”

“I’d never turn down a chance to see you again,” Alice said. “You never visited me in the Overworld after I… came back to life.”

“I’m sorry,” Yuyuko said, “I haven’t forgotten your invitation. I’ve been a little busy with the baby. I’m sure you can understand how much of a handful he can be.”

“He?” Alice said. “Yeah, I can imagine. But hey, if you ever need an extra hand, I totally wouldn’t mind dying again to help you out. And on the flipside, you and the tree tot are still welcome at my place any time.”

“I appreciate the offer,” Yuyuko said. “Both of them, in fact.”

“Well!” Remilia interrupted them. “It looks like everyone here is acquainted now. That means we can get on with the—”

There was a bright flash from the window, and the crackle of lightning shortly followed. For a few seconds, all the lights in the mansion went out, as if by magic. A spooky gust of wind flowed through the room, and there was a shriek—and then silence. One by one, the lights returned.

“Huh?” Alice said. “What just happe—” She gasped. On the other side of the room, Rumia stood emotionless and expressionless above a ghastly sight. Yuyuko Youmuko’s body laid dead on the floor, bleeding out an expanding pool of scarlet blood.

 

_Oh no! Looks like we have a murder mystery on our hands! Will Alice find her friend’s killer before another life is taken?! Next time on Beyond Nova Touhou: A Study In Scarlet – Sakuya’s Revenge?!_


	2. A Study in Scarlet - Sakuya's Revenge?!

Yuyuko Youmuko’s corpse was still fresh, its crimson blood mixing ever so sublimely with the scarlet floor tiles. Yuyuko’s head had been separated from her body, and it now laid a few feet away from the rest of the cadaver. All four of the remaining people in the room were completely silent. Until…

“Oh dear,” Remilia Flandre said. “It appears that the mommy has met a rather unfortunate end.”

“Yuyuko…” Alice said, on the verge of tears. “Who would do such a terrible thing to you?” Yuyuko Youmuko was practically Alice’s best friend. She was not going to let this murder go unpunished.

“That’s obvious,” Remilia said. “Clearly it was Sakuya Flandre’s ghost, eternally hungry for blood.”

“I thought you said you made up the legend of the Scarlet Devil’s ghost haunting this place,” Alice said. She made sure to weigh her words accusingly.

“I never said I _started_ the legend,” Remilia countered. “I merely perpetuate it at opportune times.”

“Like when you want to get away with _murder_?” Alice said.

“You think I killed her?!” Remilia said. “Why ever would I have done that?”

“Why else would you have gathered a bunch of heroes together, all in one place, if not to kill them all in one fell blow?” Alice said.

“To have a banquet in your honor, like I said,” Remilia answered. “If it’s just a matter of someone attempting to kill you all, why does it have to be me? I’m just as much a victim in this as you are!”

“How are _you_ the victim here?” Alice asked.

“My Mansion is now a crime scene,” Remilia said. “And for all we know, I’m another target.”

“We don’t even know if there are any more targets,” Marisa said. “If it was the ghost of Sakuya Flandre, her blood thirst is probably satisfied now and there’s nothing more to worry about.”

“Sakuya Flandre’s thirst for blood is _never_ satisfied,” Remilia said. “Fact, not legend.”

“It wasn’t the Scarlet Devil,” Alice said. “I don’t believe in ghosts.”

“Hey genius,” Marisa said, “didn’t you just get back from a long stay in the Underworld? Where there’s, you know, ghosts _everywhere_?”

“I don’t believe in ghosts that are smart enough to kill,” Alice clarified. “They can barely remember what their names were when they were alive.”

“But some ghosts… Rarely, but it’s happened before… Some ghosts _do_ manifest with enough intensity to have their full personalities and goals intact,” Marisa said.

“It’s happened _once_ before,” Alice said, “and there were special circumstances behind it. You know that.”

“Point taken,” Marisa said. “Have any other theories then?”

“That depends,” Alice said. “Do you have any proof that _you_ didn’t kill Yuyuko?”

“Me?!” Marisa said.

“I know you hate me,” Alice said, “and you knew I liked Yuyuko.”

“You think I might have killed Yuyuko to get back at you?!” Marisa shouted. “That’s ridiculous! If anything, it was Darkrai over here,” she said, pointing to Rumia.

“Now, now,” Remilia said, “there’s no need for discrimination. Just because you were born with your soul gem intact doesn’t give you the right to—”

“Let the girl speak for herself, Flandre,” Marisa said.

Rumia spoke. “It wasn’t me.”

“Oh yeah?” Marisa said. “Then why’ve you been so quiet this whole time?”

“You weren’t talking to me,” Rumia said.

“And why didn’t you look surprised at all to see Yuyuko dead when the lights came back on?” Marisa asked.

“I don’t need lights to see,” Rumia said. “I saw what happened to her.”

Alice gasped. “Why didn’t you tell us sooner! What happened then?”

“Yuyuko Youmuko was killed,” Rumia said.

“Yeah, but how? Who or what killed her?” Alice asked.

“Nothing. No one. She was killed, but there was no killer,” Rumia said.

“I knew it,” Marisa said. “You’re just trying to buy yourself time before we find out for sure it was you!”

“I don’t know,” Remilia said. “An invisible killer? Sounds like the Scarlet Devil’s ghost to me.”

“Everything sounds like the Scarlet Devil’s ghost to you,” Alice said. “But either way… I think we can at least agree on this much. If the killer was the ghost—”

“Then we’re all screwed,” Marisa interrupted.

“And if it wasn’t…” Alice continued.

Rumia finished for her. “Then it’s someone in this room right now.” There was another ominous bolt of lightning, and a loud boom of thunder.

“So… Now what?” Marisa asked.

“Now, none of us leave each other’s sights until we know who we can and can’t trust,” Alice said.

“I have an idea,” Remilia said. “It might be a stretch, but if we’re lucky…”

“Speak up, Flandre,” said Marisa. “What have you got in mind?”

“The library on the far side of the Mansion,” Remilia said. “It contains a host of potent spellbooks, at least one of which should have a truth spell which could assist us in this hunt for answers. A spell which would create a field in which only truths can be told. If we were to step into that field, and all say we were innocent of killing Yuyuko Youmuko…”

“No way,” Marisa said. “Figure out some other plan.”

“What’s wrong?” Alice asked. “Have something you’re hiding?”

“Am I the only one who noticed?” Marisa said. “A library full of _potent spellbooks_? And right after we agreed that the killer is one of _us_? This smells like a big stinking trap to me.”

“If it came to that, it would be three against one,” Alice said. “It’s still a good plan.”

“Any other objections?” Remilia asked the group. No one spoke up. “Then it’s settled. I’ll lead the way, and then we’ll figure out this mystery once and for all. I’m sure my librarian Patchouli will be able to find the right book for us…” And with that, the four magical girls began a cautious journey across the Scarlet Devil Mansion.

“Hey, Alice…” Marisa said at one point. “Do you really hate me?”

“I…” Alice said. “No, I—It’s complicated.”

“You still haven’t forgiven me for accepting that government contract, have you?” Marisa asked.

“Have you forgiven yourself for what the Empress made you do?” Alice countered.

“No…” Marisa said. “And I never will.”

“I still think about it, you know,” Alice said. “The good old days, back when we were still a team. I miss those days.”

“Yeah,” Marisa said. “Me too.”

“I understand why you did it,” Alice said. “Why you took on the job. You needed a lot of money quickly, and there was no other way.”

“Then why do you still hold it over me like it was some huge mistake?” Marisa asked.

“For the same reason I could understand why someone would kill another person, but never forgive them for it.” Alice sighed. “Sakuya Flandre, the original Scarlet Devil… I hope you’re doing her title the justice it deserves.”

“… Alice?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah,” Alice said. “Me too.”

“We’re here,” Remilia said. Before them was a large pair of red doors, much like the doors to the guest room they had been in previously. “I guarantee you’ve never seen a library as grand as this one! Prepare to be amazed.”

Remilia pushed the gargantuan doors open, and the scarlet light of the torches on the walls slowly filled the library room, revealing a hundred rows of bookcases, each of them at least twenty stories high. Millions of books sat perched in these thousands of bookcases, the bookcases radiating out from the center of the room. And in the center of the room was Patchouli the librarian, on the floor, dead, seeping scarlet into the already red carpets.

 

_Gasp! First Yuyuko, now the librarian?! Who else will fall victim to this mansion’s crimson curse? Next time on Beyond Nova Touhou: The Invisible Bullet – Embodiment in the Scarlet Devil Mansion!_


	3. The Invisible Bullet – Embodiment in the Scarlet Devil Mansion!

Remilia’s first instinct was to run straight into the library, to Patchouli’s aid. The others had to hold her back. “Save your strength, Flandre,” Marisa said. “It’s too late to save her now. She’s gone.”

Remilia collapsed in tears. “Patchouli didn’t deserve this! She’s never done anything bad to anyone!”

“It’s gonna be okay,” Alice said, kneeling down to hug her. “We’re gonna get through this. And we’ll find whoever’s responsible. And we’ll make them pay.”

“Well, at least now we know it’s none of us,” Marisa said. “Rumia was right after all, it must be the ghost.”

“Or a second killer,” Rumia said.

“No,” Alice said, trying to shake the thought from her head. “Please no, it’s not two killers. And it’s not necessarily Sakuya, either. All we know is it’s someone who can be invisible. There’s plenty of magic that can do that, probably even in this very library.”

Remilia gasped, offended. “Are you suggesting Patchouli was the killer?!”

“No!” Alice said. “All I’m saying is, that kind of magic is easy. Almost anyone can do it. And now that we’ve made it to the library, we have a lot more powerful magics at our disposal.”

“Oh heck no,” Marisa said, “I’m not going in there! The killer is in there!”

“The door’s been open for a while,” Alice said. “The killer could be long gone by now.”

“And if the killer was a ghost, it doesn’t matter if the door was open or closed,” Rumia said.

“Great,” Marisa said. “Back to square one.”

“Not quite,” Remilia said. “I think I have another idea, but I know you won’t like it.”

“What is it?” Alice asked.

“It involves summoning a ghost,” Remilia said.

“You were right,” Marisa said. “I don’t like that idea.”

“You want to summon Sakuya’s ghost so we can fight it on our own terms?” Alice asked.

“No,” Remilia said, “I want to summon Patchouli’s ghost so she can confirm the killer’s identity for us.”

The other three looked at each other in turn, coming to a silent agreement. “Alright,” Alice said. “Let’s do it.”

Remilia led them into the library. “Patchouli was the best librarian the Mansion ever had,” she said as she paced down the aisles of books, looking down each one. “Being the overseer of all this knowledge wasn’t just a job to her. It was a passion.” She smiled, having found the right aisle, and turned down it. “She put her soul into running this place.” Remilia grabbed a book from the shelf. It was marked with a summoning sigil on its cover. “Literally. In case anything ever happened to her, she wanted to make sure she could still keep the library safe. So, she broke off a piece of her soul and gave it to me for safe keeping.”

“She purposely cracked her soul gem?!” Marisa said. “That’s insane.”

“Being a youkrai isn’t as bad as you think it is,” Remilia said. “Besides, she only cracked off about a third of the full gem.”

“But how will that piece of her soul help us?” Alice asked. “It didn’t see who killed her; the other part of her soul did. And that part is dead now.”

“Yes,” Remilia said, “but we might be able to use the fragment I have as a beacon, to summon the rest of her soul.”

“That’s brilliant!” Alice said.

“… Clever,” said Rumia.

“So where’s the chunk she gave you?” Marisa asked.

“Right here in my hand,” Remilia said, magically manifesting a golden glowing orb a few inches wide. It condensed into an aurous gemstone which had clearly been broken off from a larger whole. The fractured edge was not as jagged as Alice expected it to be. Even when mutilating her own soul, Patchouli’s passion for the Scarlet Library must have been high enough that she could keep her head straight enough for surgical precision in her gem cutting.

Remilia flipped through the summoning book, looking for just the right spell. “Aha! Here we go. Are you guys ready?” The three other magical girls nodded. “Okay then. Let’s do this.” She placed the closed book on the floor, and put Patchouli’s soul gem in the center of the summoning symbol. She pointed her palms toward the book. “Domo… ARIGATO!”

A shrill sound filled the room and the temperature dropped at least twenty degrees in the span of a few seconds. The book started spinning wildly, like it was possessed by a demon, but the soul gem—now on fire—stuck to it as if it had been glued on. Many small orbs of white light started appearing near the girls. The orbs were drawn to each other, and one by one they combined, until there was just one big orb left. But it was no orb at all: it was the ghostly silhouette of Librarian Patchouli, eyes closed, sleeping peacefully in her death. The shrill sound ceased, and the ghost of Patchouli opened its eyes.

“Wha… What happened?” it said. “Miss Flandre? Why does my body feel so light? Where am I?”

“It’s okay, Patchouli,” Remilia said. “You’re still in the library. You, um… You were killed. You’re a ghost now.”

Patchouli looked down through her transparent body and shrieked. “Oh no! Is the library safe? How many books were taken?”

“Relax, nothing has been stolen. It wasn’t an attack on the library,” Remilia said. “We think someone’s after… well, _us_.”

“Oh…” Patchouli said. “Yes, I think my earthly memories are coming back to me now. Today was the day of the party, right?”

“Yep,” Marisa said. “That’s why we’re all here. All us ‘heroes’.”

“Someone killed Yuyuko Youmuko,” Alice said. “I think some up-and-coming evil magical girl saw this party as a good opportunity to get rid of all her threats with one move.”

“And then they killed me?” Patchouli asked.

“That’s the gist of it,” Remilia said. “We were hoping you would have seen the face of whoever it was that killed you. Although, the killer might be a ghost, or invisible, so you might not have seen anything…”

“Do you remember?” Alice asked. “Did you see who killed you?”

Patchouli focused her ghostbrain for a moment. “Yes… I do remember! It was…” Suddenly her ghostly face became overrun by fear. She lifted her arm and pointed behind the four magical girls. “That!”

The foursome looked in the direction Patchouli pointed. At the end of the aisle was an amorphous silhouette of bright red light, slowly approaching the girls. “It’s her!” Remilia shouted. “It’s the Scarlet Devil!”

“What do we do?!” Marisa said.

Alice got into a combat stance, finally letting her pent up desire for revenge flow through her veins. “We kill it before it kills us.”

“You can’t kill a ghost!” Marisa said. “We need to just get out of here before it gets any more of us!”

“Patchouli!” Alice shouted. “Are there any books in here that can tell us how to kill a ghost?”

“There should be, miss, but—”

“Then hurry up and find one!” Alice said. Realizing there was no use arguing, Patchouli quickly flew away on her new mission. “And until then…” Alice manifested a dozen small balls of blue energy. “We do this the old fashioned way.” She launched all the balls at the red apparition.

The ghost easily dodged the assault and returned fire with red energy balls of its own. Alice maneuvered around them while gathering energy for a larger attack. One of the red bullets grazed her arm. She gritted her teeth and prepared to fire her big blue ball at the phantom, but it had disappeared from her sight. She tried looking around for it. But, red walls, red carpet, red bookcases—this phantom was practically invisible.

“Behind you!” Marisa shouted, pushing Alice out of the way of a red energy beam, taking the brunt of the hit herself. “You need to watch your surroundings more closely,” she said with a pained smirk. “There’s a reason I got the contract and you didn’t.”

Alice kicked Marisa out of the way of a red bullet. “Yeah, it’s because you know how to gloat just like an empress.”

The two of them turned back to back, for a full view of the library, dodging energy balls from all directions together. “Just like in the old days, eh Reimu?” Marisa said.

“Yeah,” Alice said, “except there wasn’t any scarlet back then.”

“Scarlet…” Marisa said. “That gives me an idea! What do you say we give this place a new paintjob?”

“Hmm!” Alice said. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Let’s find out,” said Marisa. The two of them created several thousand large but weak energy balls— _blue_ energy balls—and shot them in every direction. The balls popped when they hit the walls, staining each area a light blue.

“My Mansion!” Remilia shouted.

“My Library!” Patchouli shouted.

“Smart move,” Rumia said.

When the dust settled, the entire room was bright blue. “Hah,” Alice said. “Who’s invisible _now_?”

“Up there!” Marisa shouted.

The scarlet specter was on top of a bookcase. With nowhere to hide, it simply waited as Alice and Marisa flew toward it to deliver the knockout blow. The silhouette continued to morph, its shape now looking vaguely familiar. “Wait a minute…” Alice said. “Marisa! Stop!”

“But we’ve got it cornered now!” Marisa said. “We have to—”

“No! This isn’t the Scarlet Devil,” Alice said. “This isn’t the ghost of Sakuya Flandre.” She landed in front of it, and she reached her arm towards it. The apparition formed a phantom arm and reached for Alice. “Here,” Alice said to it, “I’ll lend you some of my energy.” The two locked hands (at least as far as a corporeal being and a ghost _could_ lock hands). Alice transferred some of her magical life energy to it.

“Alice?” Marisa said, landing next to her. “Do you know what you’re doing?”

“Of course I do,” Alice said. “I’m returning a favor.” The ghost’s redness faded and its true shape took hold, revealing its true identity to all. “Are you okay, Yuyuko?” Alice asked.

“Yuyuko?!” Remilia said, joining the others on top of the bookcase along with Patchouli and Rumia.

“Hi everyone,” the newly reliving Yuyuko Youmuko said. “How much did I miss?”

“Alright, I have no idea what’s going on anymore,” Marisa said. “Someone please fill me in.”

“Yuyuko! We thought you were killed!” Remilia said.

“I was,” Yuyuko said. “Sorry I had to leave on such short notice. Something came up in the Underworld, and I had to get there as quickly as possible. So I killed myself.”

“ _What_?!” Marisa said. “Why would you do that!”

“Silly Marisa,” Alice said with a wink, “there’s only one way into the Underworld.”

“Precisely,” Yuyuko said.

“So what was going down in the Underworld?” Marisa asked.

“Some goons broke into my house,” Yuyuko said. “They woke the baby up, and I heard him crying. That’s why I left so quickly. Anyway, I took care of those guys, made sure everything was okay, and I’ve been trying to rematerialize here ever since. Thanks for speeding that process along, Alice. Do you still have enough energy left in you for yourself?”

“No worries,” Alice said. “A few hours rest and I should be good as new.”

“That makes two of us,” Yuyuko said. “I hope my ghost didn’t cause too much havoc for you while my conscious mind was dormant.”

“You killed me,” Patchouli said.

“Oh goodness, I must apologize for that,” Yuyuko said. “If you’d like, I could put in the paperwork in the Underworld to have you resurrected. I’m on quite good terms with the Hierarchy down there.”

“You could do that?” Patchouli asked. “Thank you so much, I would be eternally in your debt! … Literally, I guess.”

“It’s the least I can do for all the trouble I’ve caused you,” Yuyuko said. “So then. Is it time for the party to begin?”

Everyone fell over like an anime.

 

***

 

_The next night_

 

Rumia stood  silently, waiting at the border between Touhou and Gensokyo. It was getting late; her companions should have been back by now. This should not have been a difficult border for them to cross, after all their practice. Finally, a Pegasus-drawn carriage appeared on the horizon of the shifting nether between planes. Rumia waited for it to reach her.

When it did, two magical girls stepped out of it. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” one of them said. “You didn’t tell us she’d be there. We thought you were going to be keeping an eye on her.”

“I was,” Rumia said.

“We failed the plan. We couldn’t kidnap the tree,” the girl said.

“That was never the plan,” Rumia said. “You were just the distraction.”

“Yeah, I kind of figured,” the girl said. “So how did things go on your end? Better luck?”

“Yes,” Rumia said. “Better than expected. Alice Reimu is more than I ever could have hoped for.”

“Does she have any idea who she really is?” the girl asked.

“No,” Rumia said. “And she never will.”


End file.
